FMA releases final guidance on Effective Disclosure

8 June 2012

FMA releases final guidance on Effective Disclosure

The Financial Markets Authority (FMA) has today released its final guidance note for issuers, directors and advisers on Effective Disclosure.

Following publication of the revised draft guidance in April, FMA has engaged with industry and consumer groups and received 40 submissions, which were overwhelmingly positive.

FMA Head of Primary Regulatory Operations, Sue Brown, said the final guidance note will improve the quality, accuracy and relevance of the information provided to investors by issuers.

“We have refined the guidance in response to the highly constructive issues raised by submitters in the second round of consultation. We hope that issuers and their advisers now have a clear understanding of how the guidance applies to their disclosure documents, and FMA’s expectations,” said Brown.

“We encourage issuers to work with us to improve the quality of disclosure information, and to ensure potential investors and financial advisers can turn to disclosure documents for clear, concise and effective information.”

FMA will start using the guidance note as part of its risk based assessment of offer documents for new issues from 9 July 2012, and for continuous issues, from 1 January 2013.

“We look forward to working with industry as they start to align their documents with the guidance,” said Sue Brown.

“This is about increasing the levels of informed participation in the markets, which contributes to capital growth, which is good for the economy.”

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